Why should DFID and other development agencies see security and justice as core business? This review finds a growing body of empirical evidence to support the argument that shortfalls in security and justice are central to poverty, underdevelopment and limit the ability to meet the MDGs. It highlights how the question of the ways in which donor assistance programmes can be delivered is missing from the literature, and outlines a number of knowledge and methodological gaps.
For the purpose of this review, security and justice are defined in terms of access to a minimum level of private and public safety and law and order.
The paper identifies a number of key gaps in the knowledge base on security and justice issues, briefly discussing some of the implications on donor assistance programming.
- There is extensive evidence in existing literature that poor people across conflict-affected, fragile and low-income societies have strong opinions about the relevance of security and justice in their daily lives. The World Bank’s Voices of the Poor report captures the focus on multidimensional poverty that characterised the international development debates of the 1990s. The findings and conclusions of the report have been replicated and reinforced in subsequent empirical surveys. While these perspectives and their relevance vary depending on gender, age, and geographical location, there are commonalities: the ways in which a lack of security affects, for example, access to public services, public transportation, and education; the links between youth participation in armed conflict and lack of justice; and the perceived failures of security and justice provision to adequately support the poorest who often have the most difficult accessing justice and fear discriminatory practices from the police and other institutions.
- Empirical evidence supports the strong conceptual basis that security and justice shortfalls are a major constraint on meeting the MDGs. Poor people tend to suffer most in conflict situations and the economic cost of conflict is high. Increasing security and justice empowers poor people in ways which allow them to drive and benefit from processes of development.
- There is a growing body of household and societal level evidence that connects the wellbeing and ill-being of poor people directly with advances and shortfalls in security and justice provision. Crime, violence, corruption and displacement need to be understood as critical drivers, constraints and conditioners of development (and obstacles to achieving the MDGs) – not just security and justice issues.
The literature that advocates the case for security and justice-focused donor assistance, does not address how best these programmes can be delivered. Other knowledge gaps include:
- the indirect consequences of self-help activities (militias and vigilantes, for example) on community welfare when labour has been diverted from other productive sectors;
- how, when and why poor people, especially youth, may be making careers out of security and justice shortfalls;
- how security and justice provisioning relates to the informal sector, where the poor often work;
- how particular demographic groups are affected by a lack of SJ provision;
- how increased state security and justice provision has improved the welfare of populations and MDG progress.
Methodologically, it is not clear the best way to identify the parameters of a security and justice policy terrain. Should crime, violence and corruption be the focus or should a broader emphasis on issues that indirectly have an impact on vulnerable groups’ welfare (e.g. judicial independence, investment laws) be included?
